Gene Wilder, Star of ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,’ Dies at 83

Gene Wilder, the blue-eyed, frazzle-haired acting professional who raised anxiety to a comedian talent in regular cooperation with Mel Streams (The Manufacturers, Younger Frankenstein) and Rich Pryor (Silver Ability, Mix Crazy), passed away on Weekend in Stamford, Burglary, from problems from Alzheimer’s disease. His close relatives verified his death to media on Monday night. Wilder was 83.

Wilder perhaps is most lovingly kept in mind as the fascinating chocolate man and “Pure Imagination” crooner of Willy Wonka and the Candy Manufacturer.

Blazing Horse saddles, helmed by Streams and co-written by Streams and Pryor, and Bonnie and Clyde are two other oldies among Wilder’s approximately three number of TV and movie attributes.

Though associated with funnymen Streams and Pryor — Wilder handled three films in all with Streams, and costarred reverse Pryor in four — Wilder was silently insistent that he was not a comedian.

“I am really not — except in a funny movie,” Wilder said in 2013.

Maybe because others recognized him as an acting professional first as well, Wilder was the unusual funny celebrity who was created welcome at the adult desk. He was twice selected for an Oscar: a Best Assisting Actor nod for The Manufacturers and a movie script nod for his and Brooks’s Younger Frankenstein.